Notes and Editorial Reviews

"Even after listening many times to this Bridge Records CD of music by the young American composer Dan Visconti, it's still difficult to describe. He certainly doesn't write in any one particular style, and you can't apply a label such as minimalist, modernist or bluesman to him, even for a single work... The opening track,
Black Bend for string quintet, starts with what sounds like distant train whistles and buzzing insects. Then we hear a train on its tracks and a simple tune from a single violin. More string players are added, and the music grows subtly bluesy. Suddenly, it breaks, and all five players wailing the blues! ... Do listen to the solo bassoon track provided to get a feeling for what the music can sound like, andRead more hear BPO Bassoonist Markus Weidmann bring this completely original piece to a foot-stomping, key-fluttering, reed-blasting conclusion." -- Peter Ballyk, expeditionaudio.com

"Lonesome Roads" is the first full-length CD of music by the 30-year old American, Dan Visconti (b. 1982). Annotator Daniel Felsenfeld writes: "Lonesome Roads is a nod to the American century. The grit and vernacular of the M­­­inimalists can be found in the bassoon solo called Ramble and Groove, and the blues-soaked string quartet Black Bend; the raw, unfettered beauty of the Neo-Romantics is in the plainspun prettiness of Lawless Airs; and the compositional rigor and adherence to lofty notions of the High Modernists is in the opening movements of Fractured Jams. And there are pieces, like Low Country Haze or Lonesome Roads that either meld or ignore these mostly obsolete distinctions for music that is just plain rapturous to hear." Performances are by members of the Berlin Philharmonic and the Horszowski Trio. Read less

Customer Reviews

Average Customer Review: ( 1 Customer Review )

Music for ExplorersApril 11, 2013By Ralph Graves (Hood, VA)See All My Reviews"Dan Visconti is a composer who's equally at home with classical and popular music traditions. The works on "Lonesome Roads" benefit from this convergence. Their vernacular gestures and rhythms help audiences immediately connect with them, giving even non-classical listeners readily understood points of reference. And the classical underpinnings to the works give them a satisfying complexity and structural integrity that reveals new details and relationships with every hearing. If you're fed up with Top 40 and are exploring the edges of alternative music, "Lonesome Roads" will take you just a little further. If you're tired of the same old/same old classical repertoire, and are looking for something other than dry academic exercises, "Lonesome Roads" will renew your faith in classical music's contemporary relevance."Report Abuse

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